The Manifest · Issue 001 ·
Six companies agreed on a standard. Two things they didn't mention.
Claude Code isn't a launch partner — but plugins install there anyway.
Hi — welcome to the first issue of The Manifest.
Once a week, we’ll send you what passed, what didn’t, and what we’re learning from the AgenticSkills directory. No generic AI news roundup. Just useful stuff.
THE SIGNAL / 01
Six companies agreed on a standard. Two things they didn't mention.
On August 6, Vercel, AWS, Cursor, GitHub, Microsoft, and OpenAI agreed on Agent Plugins — an open format for bundling Agent Skills and MCP servers into one installable package. One command, and a whole stack is on your machine.
The announcement got plenty of coverage. Two things in it didn't, and both will matter if you're building.
- Claude Code isn't a launch partner — and installs plugins anyway.npx plugins add treats it as a supported target and translates the format into Claude's own plugin system. Not native support, but it works today.
- There's a plugin.json collision.Claude Code uses .claude-plugin/plugin.json. Agent Plugins uses root-level plugin.json. Same name, different schema. Check which one a README means before you copy it.
NEW & VETTED / 02
Design just landed.
We added six new skills to AgenticSkills this week, opening up an entirely new Design & UI/UX category:
THE PICK / 03
Designer Skills Collection
B-RANK · 2.3K STARS · 6 CONTRIBUTORS · UPDATED 20 DAYS AGO · BY OWL-LISTENER
This one’s big. Designer Skills Collection contains 107 individual skills covering design research, design systems, interaction design, prototyping, UI, UX strategy, and visual critique.
What makes it interesting isn’t the size. It’s the granularity.
Instead of vaguely telling an agent to “follow UX best practices,” individual skills are grounded in principles like Fitts’s Law, Hick’s Law, Jakob’s Law, Miller’s Law, Tesler’s Law, Gestalt grouping, and the peak-end rule.
Don’t install the whole thing just because you can. Pick the areas that match how you work.
$ npx skills add Owl-Listener/designer-skills
WORKFLOW / 04
Build a complete auth flow in ~40 minutes
BETTER AUTH + SHADCN + RESEND · 6 SKILLS · 2 MCP SERVERS
Every SaaS hits the same wall in week one: auth.
This workflow takes you from a fresh Next.js app to email/password, magic links, email verification, 2FA, social login, and protected routes — with the skills and MCP servers your agent needs along the way.
It also handles the stuff that usually burns the time: the Next.js 16 proxy.ts change, database migrations, Resend setup, and defense-in-depth route protection.
A workflow isn’t a list of links. It’s the order in which your agent should use them.
That’s it for Issue 001. See you next week.
— The Manifest